Disclaimer: The rights to Ace attorney belong to Capcom. I own nobody...maybe except for one or two characters in this story.

Turnabout Matrimony


BANG!

All the people in court were in chattering and murmuring loudly amongst themselves before the Judge slammed his gavel down on the surface of his podium and the single loud ear-splitting "bang" it made was a sound that reverberated throughout the whole courtroom and left a lingering echo in its wake. The smooth ceilings and walls somehow kept the echo contained within the room and it made certain that any noise would stay confined within.

Upon hearing the sound everybody fell silent. The crowd had ceased making even a peep while they stared anxiously at the judge whom had been seated behind the podium, the podium seemed quite high and intimidating and even more so with the old man perched behind it. But despite the high bench, the old man seemed quite friendly as he always did.

Yet he seemed to have his gaze fixed on both the defence and the prosecution below.

Phoenix and Athena were all set as they stood behind their bench and awaited for the Judge to begin speaking and hear the opening statement from prosecutor Gaspen Payne.

The smug man standing behind the bench opposite them was smoothing his tie down with a very tight smirk wound on his face, he appeared to have assumed an awfully boastful and self-assured position as he stood behind his bench with a good stack of files neatly set aside and ready to be presented. The two defence attorneys couldn't hold back their own icy cold glares as they tried to quickly gather their thoughts before they started to go down with their ship of potential despair and probable underprepared-bluffing.

The judge gruffly cleared his throat and rubbed the sleepiness out of his eyes.

Phoenix's wiry brows creased with concern "Um...are you alright, your honour?"

The Judge yawned and nodded tiredly "I am perfectly fine, Mr. Wright...I...I just stayed up a bit late last night watching dramatic television programs..."

Phoenix and Athena sent cursory glances to each other; they knew that the fickle old judge was truly getting along in his years and it sounded just like him to stay up all night like he was a mischievous teen disobeying curfews. But they were happy to hear that he was alright.

After recollecting his thoughts, the judge raised his gavel and smacked it down on the surface of the podium.

Hard.

"Now, before we begin, let's hear the opening statement."

Prosecutor Payne nodded his head obediently in the judge's direction before he assumed a pompous posture and proceeded to talk everybody through what had transpired a mere day ago.

"It all occurred yesterday in the local church where the bride-to-be, or should I say defendant—" He took this chance to cast a withering glare towards a cowering Juniper "—was walking down the aisle where the groom was awaiting her,"

Phoenix couldn't help but pick up the obvious sneer in Payne's tone, he could only imagine how much Athena noticed it because he saw how hacked-off she was becoming as she seethed silently where she stood; the rage was crystal clear on her facial features. He didn't have Athena's special sense of hearing, but if he did he was certain that her rage would be at a fever pitch.

The judge looked at the prosecutor curiously whilst quirking a wrinkly ivory brow at him. "And, if you don't mind me asking, who was the groom?"

Prosecutor Payne wore a straight face and paused for a moment before answering.

"...Apollo Justice,"

The judge seemed shocked to hear this, his eyes bulged in their sockets and he wore a dumbstruck expression on his old yet wise face. He was so surprised that even his snow white beard bristled in response to the information he had just heard. His expression then turned from shock to hurt within the timespan of five seconds.

"WHAT! Apollo Justice was actually getting married and no one thought to invite me?"

The disappointment was very clear in the judge's tone, he looked sadly down at his feet as his facial expression betrayed how hurt he was by not receiving an invitation. Athena then turned her head to face the spiky-haired lawyer stood next to her, her bright blue eyes pooling with tears of shame and sympathy once taking a listen to the judge's heart. "Aww, I feel so bad for his honour..."

Phoenix now felt kind of awful, if he had known that the judge wanted to attend the wedding then he would have sent one. He just didn't think the judge would even want to come considering that there was the possibility that he could have been busy or something with court proceedings and stuff. After seeing the sullen expression on the old man's face, he felt his heart break a little.

Then he shook his head quick to snap himself out of it.

They had a trial to win!

Gaspen Payne had watched the scene with growing irritation and impatientce. as he folded his arms moodily across his chest in a sulk, then he promptly cleared his throat aloud to bring the main focus back to himself. His sunglasses glimmered angrily in the light.

"AHEM! If I could please be allowed to continue..."

Everybody silenced themselves and all eyes in the room snapped back to the pompous prosecutor and everyone watched whilst he smoothed his tie and cleared his throat a second time, albeit more calmly and it seemed to be more for preparing himself and less for regaining everyone's attention this time.

Payne resumed saying his piece.

"As I was saying -just before the two could make their vows, a family member had burst into the room and announced what had befallen Mrs. Maple Woods, the defendant's grandmother and guardian," Payne lowered his head as though he were genuinely saddened, "and when we reached the scene we saw the defendant knelt in front of the victim whom was stabbed to death by an unknown murder weapon."

Everyone in the gallery hung on Payne's every word and started muttering although they each had a variety of reactions. Some of the people shook their heads in disgust, others reacted angrily at hearing such a barbaric deed; regardless it appeared that everybody who was in attendance didn't like the sound of what had happened to the elderly lady. Heck, a very few people were even scowling darkly at poor Junie.

That hardly gone unnoticed by the terrified bride-to-be, though, as she glanced downward and hid behind the stand as though to hide herself from those glaring faces...and it didn't go unnoticed by her two defence attorneys.

Athena looked worriedly to her boss. "M-Mr. Wright, I can hear the hostility in the hearts of the people in the gallery..."

(And I can feel it...) Phoenix thought in agreement.

The emotions were very easy to read off of the people in the gallery, it felt like a dark aura in the courtroom and it almost made the ace attorney in blue falter at the unease that swarmed in the atmosphere. He tried not to let the unease show on his face as he grit his teeth and bared on through it whilst he took a moment to smile reassuringly at Juniper in hopes to coax her out of hiding a little bit.

Junie did seem to spot that smile and weakly smiled back at him for a moment.

Then the judge started to speak and asked an obvious question.

"You don't know what the murder weapon was?"

Payne shook his head in response. "No, your honour, we're still having the detectives go through the church searching as we speak, we suspect that the weapon was taken from the crime scene."

Phoenix absorbed this new information into his brain. A missing murder weapon, that sounded both intriguing and strange since normally criminals leave the murder weapon at the scene unless this a carefully executed killing, but there was something off about that statement. Something he couldn't place his finger on, yet he didn't have much time to swell on that detail since the judge had decided to go right ahead and speak whilst he raised his gavel.

"Mr. Wright, do you have any thoughts on this?"

The spiky-haired lawyer looked at the judge and truthfully shook his head. "No, your honour."

The judge seemed shocked. "Wait a second...you don't?"

Phoenix shook his head slowly. "No. Why? Is there a problem?"

The judge looked at Phoenix with a dumbstruck yet utterly perplexed expression on his face, his jaw went slack. The barbed-headed attorney would normally make an objection to the prosecution's statements right about now! This was kind of unusual since the man looked even neutral about it. Even Athena looked stunned to hear that!

The judge looked as though he had been sucking a lemon for a long few moments before he finally rediscovered his voice and continued to speak after a moment of awkward silence.

"Uh, erm, um, alright then..."

Payne seemed too glad to proceed and took this unimportant subject end as his cue to continue onward with the opening statement. He plucked a random piece of paper from his desk and held it up for everyone to see, especially for Phoenix and Athena. The paper was but a plain white sheet with scribbles of writing and neatly-scribed sentences that looked awfully well written and detailed.

"Distinguished members of the jury!" He exclaimed, trying to sound ultimately dramatic with this nerdy and uncool flare following him "I consider this as definitive proof of the defendant's guilt; an little piece of paper found in the defendant's room describing some interesting things."

Still Phoenix said not a word, he just looked on patiently as if he were waiting for something to happen.

Athena looked at him with an astonished expression; why wasn't he saying anything, why was he looking like a predator awaiting for the perfect opportunity to strike his prey? She didn't say anything but she was certainly confused of what he was waiting for exactly. She narrowed her eyes and her frown stiffened while she tried to visually discern what her boss was doing.

Payne's twittering voice faded a bit in the background, although the lawyer in yellow listened closely.

"It describes how Maple Woods was to perish by the time the wedding ceremony was to take place, and it also includes...uuugggh..." the pompous prospector blanched and he suddenly turned a vibrant shade of pale green. "...s-s-some disturbingly graphic and gory content,"

Athena was a bit green in the face after hearing that. She shuddered inwardly when the implications of that "disturbingly graphic and gory content" could possibly be made her intestines started to crawl and turn at such a thought. Her head swayed when merely thinking of it. She tried to shake it off and she hugged her own arms as though a sudden chill crept into the courtroom, preying on her sanity.

In the meantime, Phoenix appeared to be mildly put off by this too. He looked as pale as a sheet but he took some calming breaths as though to calm himself and keep himself from vomiting. The spiky haired lawyer continued to do naught but observe regardless of being greatly sickened.

Snapping herself out of it, the ginger lawyer in yellow slammed her hand on the surface of the bench and cut Payne off.

"Someone could've just planted that in Junie's bedroom, y'know!"

The arrogant prosecutor just grinned wickedly as a sharp glance was whisked her way and he said to her with a sickeningly patronisingly honeyed tone, all while he curled his fringe in his hair with a finger. "Hush, little girl, and let the grownup finish."

That comment angered the young lady; she had been angry so many times before this and never had it been too bad...but if somebody made fun of her then she would be an out-of-control beast that nobody could tame. Athena's face twisted into a deep dark scowl of fury and widget turned a violent red colour and she got ready to rip out the insufferable man's throat with her fingernails alone.

She started to shriek out aggressively "Why you pig-headed—!"

Thankfully, Phoenix had finally stepped in before Athena could seize the chance to run over and rip Gaspen Payne's smug face off.

"HOLD IT!"

The spiky-haired attorney's voice was like a sonic boom of sound, it was like the cymbal of thunder in the midst of a calm storm. The sound of his calm yet brass voice bounced off the ceiling and walls and crated a reverberation of sound. He stood as proud as a lion when it had sunk its teeth into its freshly-killed prey. Everybody was silent as a funeral pall hung in the air of the court.

It felt like hours before the ace attorney opened his mouth and talked.

"Mr. Payne...would you mind showing us all of the evidence you've found?"

Payne seemed astonished, it was as though he hadn't a clue as to where he was for a minute. His posture was frozen in time and his facial expression portrayed pure surprise; however he quickly recovered and his lips formed into a very sardonic smile.

He pulled out all his cards on the table and produced a piece of evidence one-by-one, each and every little bit of evidence had been sealed in a little transparent plastic bag: there was a blood-soaked rose broach, a little damp piece of card, a half-broken ornament, the victim's autopsy report folder, a strangely eerie newspaper clipping, a lone photograph of the original crime scene, and a crimson/prune-stained tear of golden fabric.

Prosecutor Payne shoved the autopsy report over to Phoenix, and the attorney in blue then proceeded to pick up the folder and then started to read the details on the report; "Victim died instantly of stab wound through the heart and blood loss, had elevated blood pressure due to stress and panic."

The judge gave a nod of his bald head and declared, "All of this shall be submitted as evidence."

Upon lifting his eyes, Phoenix looked to Athena. The young lady looked at him quizzically with her frown being forced as down as it could possibly go. One of her thin eyebrows was furrowed and the other was raised in an arch, big blue eyes were overflowing with curiosity and it was obvious that she wanted to know about why he didn't say much for awhile there.

The ace attorney cleared his throat and subtly leaned towards his student, murmuring his explanation for staying quiet for so long discreetly into her ear; "I figured that since we didn't have much evidence to begin with, other than that glove, then maybe I could be silent and let Payne sing like a canary."

Athena now understood why her boss was so silent at least and she now felt happy to be enlightened, even though she'd have preferred a warning first or else she wouldn't have cut the information gathering off. She looked shamefully downwards, feeling kind of guilty, but the older spiky-haired man placed his hand on her head and then proceeded to tussle her hair playfully under his palm reassuringly, only to remove it seconds later.

Little did either of the two lawyers realise that the judge hadn't finished his sentence. He spoke in a calm and all around neutral tone of voice and his wise old eyes focused solely on the two defence attorneys stood at the bench. His cloudy eyes closed for a moment before he reopened them to give his own opinion on the matter.

"The piece of paper does seem like definitive evidence of the accused's guilt."

"HOLD IT!"

Athena abruptly cut in.

She raised her hand high as though she were about to ask a question to her school teacher in front of her whole class and she looked hard at prosecutor Payne, her beautiful sapphire blue eyes gleaming with hard determination. She seemed so calm and composed, she knew that her time to shine was now as she went ahead fearlessly and exclaimed to the prosecutor.

"B-But wait! What about a motive?"

For a moment, prosecutor Payne looked like a deer caught in the headlights.

Then that moment ended -that arrogantly obnoxious smile never left his lips as he tapped his toupee and picked up and started to pat that newspaper article in an almost taunting gesture, sending a very sharp smile over towards a distressed Juniper whom was coughing and suddenly looking mortified as the Prosecutor started to reveal what info that newspaper would certainly hold.

It was obvious to everyone that Junie didn't want anyone to know. Her skin turned from pale from sickly green within seconds and she subconsciously gripped her wrist whilst bowing her head and closing her eyes with sweat dripping relentlessly down her face. Her lips were tightly sealed into a frightened frown and her chest was violently thumping as though coughs were building up inside and were literally bursting to get out.

Phoenix was concerned. What was going on?

Junie pleaded through a desperate and meek tone. "No...d-don't read th-that, please, I'm begging y-you!"

"I ask this court to turn its attention to this 23-year-old article from the news paper. I do believe that this should bring a much more clearer motive to light..." He began, ignoring the poor wish-to-be-judge/bride-to-be's pleas and cries of mercy.

Neither Phoenix or Athena knew precisely why but they both felt seriously ill when Payne had brought out that old newspaper article as it made their stomachs twist into loops and corkscrews and they could feel their throats clog up.

Just what was Prosecutor Payne trying to imply?

Why was Junie so afraid of Payne disclosing what truths that piece of paper held?

Why were they getting the feeling that this was going to damage their case?

Finally after a few long painstakingly seconds, Payne presented the newspaper clipping and showed its contents for the whole entire courtroom to see.

"The victim had been suspected of killing the defendant's parents all those years ago!"

The Prosecutor exclaimed whilst wearing a very dark gleeful expression on his face. He seemed to have been enjoying this moment very much, despite the remorse he shown at the wedding and when talking of grandma Woods.

The gallery went nuts as they broke into loud chatters of shock and gossip.

Junie's eyes welled up with tears and her lower lip quivered as she tried not to break down because of that outlandish accusation. Her hands trembled as she gripped on tight to the edges of the defendant's bench whilst she yelled out with a pained tone behind her every word.

"N-N-NOOO! M-MY GRANDMA WOULD NEVER—!" She started to shout in her meek tone, her eyes overflowing with tears which started to cascade in rivulets down her chalk white cheeks. She was cut off by a serious fit of coughing which sounded so wheezy and painful to listen to. She was obviously in a right state now as she gripped on tight to the stand and tried to clear her system.

Prosecutor Payne, knowing that he had another opening of attack, continued "During the Investigation all those years ago, an igniter was found inside the remains of the car belonging to Mr. Bramble Woods and Mrs. Amber Woods -an igniter with the victim's fingerprints on it!"

Juniper broke down into sobs right there on the stand as she wept loudly and solemnly.

Whilst the bride-to-be cried to herself, the crowd sat in the gallery loudly murmured their opinions to each other, it didn't take long until it all broke into a racket, the gossip bred and multiplied like a germ infestation.

They continued to chatter in loud tones whilst Prosecutor Payne folded his arms with a huge grin fixed on his lips. He seemed pleased that he had managed to break the bride-to-be and that only increased the fuming anger of the duo who stood at her defence.

"Heh. This should be more than enough for a motive," Payne looked up and across to Juniper. "Now miss Woods, I can see that my thoughts of you all those years ago were well founded. I can't believe you would stoop so low and do the unthinkable on your very own wedding day...it must have been such a rush of bloodlust for you. To bring down the woman who raised you, and killed your parents!"

Phoenix and Athena swiftly looked over at each other. This situation had just suddenly spiralled out-of-control, thanks to Gaspen Payne. He probably played that card to try and rattle both the defence and the poor defendant! The fact that Payne resorted to such an underhanded trick had enraged both Phoenix and Athena.

The judge smacked his gavel down repeatedly on the podium, trying to regain some control after Payne had blown it all out of proportion.

"Order, order! I will have order in this court! Order!"

As the judge's cries for peace had fallen on deaf ears, all Phoenix and Athena could do was look at the scene with looks of pure disbelief on their faces. This trial had crumbled faster than a dried up gross apple crumble and the yellow and blue attorneys could hardly believe that Juniper's grandmother's murder was tied to the tragic death of her parents.

Out of all of it, they both knew one thing from all of this:

Things for Juniper's case had turned from "bad" to "worse".


A/N: Hi, everyone! Sorry that it took so long to update this.

I have just been through some stuff so I can't update as frequently as I used to, so that's why I don't update as much anymore. But with AA 6 coming out soon (OMG, I CANT WAIT) I thought that I should update this so you guys don't have to hang anymore. Thanks for being so patient with me, btw.

Anyways, it seems that everything had gone bad thanks to the mean Prosecutor Payne whom seems pretty aggressive with poor Juniper. We also uncover a pretty deep secret about Juniper's parents and everything had slipped into chaos, can our two attorneys take back the reins?

Find out in the next chapter!

-Chloemcg